


Just Desserts

by curi_o



Series: Pain for Jayne [1]
Category: Firefly
Genre: Content: Angst, F/M, Topics: Abduction/Kidnapping, Topics: Drunkenness, Warning: Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-17
Updated: 2006-08-17
Packaged: 2017-11-08 22:52:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/448447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/curi_o/pseuds/curi_o
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He’d been gone far too long. Someone woulda seen that by now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Desserts

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the first prompt from my "Pain for Jayne" table: Rain.

* * *

He’d been gone far too long. Someone woulda seen that by now. Mal would be plannin’ one of those flashy rescues an’ the moonbrain’d do her thing and he’d be outta this _gorram_ cage before they took another finger.

He’d told Mal it was a bad idea to set down here. The people here had cause to remember him, but it sure as _go se_ weren’t like Canton. Everything had gone smooth and shiny on his job here, except for all of ‘em had seen his face and knew his name—his _real_ name.

Cap’n hadn’t listened, ‘course. Told Jayne he weren’t like to be needed off-boat anyway. Said he’d draw too much attention and left him to guard Serenity. That evening, after the job, Mal’d invited him off to the local bar.

As time passed in the cell, he began to worry. Of _course_ she weren’t coming. Not after how they’d parted. Not after what he’d done. He sighed.

* * *

It weren’t like he’d _meant_ to get so drunk. He’d just been relaxin’ and stopped rememberin’ to count. An’ then _she’d_ walked into the bar. She was all manner of shiny: small, dark hair, legs that just refused to stop. An’ he’d caught her eye an’ she’d slipped into his lap ‘fore he could blink.

He’d had one hand tangled in her hair and another runnin’ up her thigh when he was surprised by a fist crashing into his jaw, followed by a pained moan. He’d blinked at his own pain and jerked his head from left to right, searching for the _hun dan_ what was interruptin’ him an’ his… girl.

Oh, _wo de tian_. He’d looked at the body in his lap. The dark hair had faded to red, the legs shortened impossibly, her breasts inflated like balloons in an instant. He swallowed an’ tried to clear the haze in his mind.

 _River_. He’d thought he was holding _River_. Yet there she was, standing beside him, an’ the body in his arms… 

He was humped. He’d gone an’ screwed up the best thing ever happened to him an’ he knew there weren’t no way to get it back.

Best to get it over with all at once, then. He swallowed again an’ hoped the Shepherd’s God would forgive him for what he was going to say next.

“I do somethin’ got yer panties in a twist, little girl? You should know better’n to play with men’r bigger’n you. Ain’t nothin’ but a real woman,” he added, nodding toward the redhead, “can take a man like me.” 

The look in River’s eyes made his whole body tense, tightening his hands around the redhead, who giggled at his apparent lust. Some part of Jayne snorted at the concept. Weren’t no possible way he could talk his body into relaxin’ enough for that for a good long time.

River’s _eyes_. He wanted to throw the redhead across the room an’ pick his girl up an’ take her back home an’ apologize to her with everything he had. He wanted to invent new ways to say he was sorry an’ cry in her hair an’ prove to her that he loved her. He looked away before he lost control.

Mal’s face across the booth was harder’n he’d ever seen it. His eyes fixed on Jayne for a moment before he slid out of the booth, put an arm around River’s waist an’ his other hand on his gun, an’ strode purposefully from the bar.

The woman in his lap wiggled against Jayne, trying to get his attention. Startled, he swiftly pushed her away, threw a few credits on the table and ran from the bar. He weren’t headed anywhere in particular, didn’t pay attention to the streets around him. It weren’t until he hit a dead end that he stopped to catch his breath. And everything went black.

* * *

He’d _told_ Mal these folk knew his face. He’d warned him it weren’t as safe as their contact promised. He tried to tell himself it weren’t his _gorram_ fault everything’d gone to hell.

His captors had woken him by breaking his left pinkie finger before cutting it off. They didn’t ask him questions, didn’t yell at him, didn’t say nothin’ at all. They did laugh, though. Their laughter was hard an’ bitter. They meant to make him hurt. An’ when he hurt so badly he couldn’t feel at all, they were going to leave him in the desert to die.

He moaned. They’d taken his right pinkie two hours after the left. He’d watched them feed it to the mongrel that whined at their feet. He’d never be able to touch River again, not like he had. 

He shook his head vigorously to stop the thoughts. River weren’t his no more. He’d gone an’ lost her, hurt her till she’d understood he was no good. She wouldn’t want him to touch her like he had, even if he c—.

An’ then she was in front of him. She’d slipped in silent an’ steady an’ he couldn’t stop the expression that crossed his face: relief an’ hope an’ love an’ agony an’ horror. She looked him in the eyes an’ grinned.

The sight near stopped his heart cold. She’d promised she could kill him with her brain, an’ the feral look in her eyes had him convinced she could. She slunk closer to the where he was chained against the rusty wall, stopped just a breath from his bare chest. _Gorram_ if he weren’t still turned on by her so near him.

She tilted her head up to him, a perfect imitation of her stance when they’d first kissed. Her eyes were hard as she murmured mockingly, “Copper for a kiss?”

An’ then she was gone. She’d taken her home an’ her family an’ left him to the end he deserved. He wouldn’t have believed she’d been there at all if it weren’t for the knife she’d slid into his right hand. The single bullet of the exiled sailor, was the blade.

And his chest shuddered as he listened to the sound of the rain.


End file.
